Google Dev 1 smartphone unable to buy paid-for Android apps
Android Dev 1 smartphone
It appears that anybody who has bought one of the unlocked Android Dev 1 versions of the HTC Dream is going to be in for a rude awakening when they try to buy an application from the Android Market. It seems that Google has made it so that the dev version of the phones can’t buy paid-for applications, seemingly because this version of the Dream gives full root access, which means access to every file in the device.
As such, it would make it easy to pirate the applications that were purchased on the device.
Of course, as EngadgetMobile points out, there are other rooted G1s out there, and those are still capable of buying applications and giving users access to the raw files.
If I had gone out and paid $400 for this unlocked device, I know that I’d be pissed off about this limitation. Anybody out there have one and has seen this ban in action? Let us know in the comments, please.
I have the dev 1 phone, and i want pay for applications, and get system update normally if i want!
[...] jesse-priest shared a link on Google Reader. Google Dev 1 smartphone unable to buy paid-for Android apps [...]
Since this was not “advertised” as a “feature” of the Dev Phone (I considered one myself), purchases of it had no way of expecting this limited functionality. There was no indication that the Android Market would be limited in this way, so Google should make good on this. If they can’t be man enough, or if their partners won’t “let” them offer paid apps to the Dev phone, then they should offer a tradeout for owners of a Dev phone to replace it with a “real” G1 at no charge for those owners who were duped by this.
This is flat-out ridiculous…
[...] [androidauthority] [...]
How about Google modify the market to allow developers posting apps to choose whether dev phones can have access to their apps or not.
This is a “how much do I trust my customers issue” and should be down to the developers and each individual app, not Google and a blanket ban.
The people who want to do bad things will find a way anyhow, most people want to do the right thing, I have no problem paying for apps.
[...] you may remember, last month we revealed how the Android Dev Phone did not have access to the paid applications from the Android market place. This was primarily because of the fact that this version of the HTC [...]